SPURS WERE IRRESISTIBLE ...BUT THEY SHOULD HAVE SCORED EIGHT!
(Kane and Co can’t afford to be this wasteful against mighty Juventus)
The last player to score against Juventus was Martin Caceres of Verona. That was last year. The player before him was Gianmarco Ferrari of Sampdoria on November 19. This was also the last time Juventus lost. It was the weekend Arsenal beat Tottenham at the emirates. Seems an age ago, now.
Asked how he planned to prepare his team for the challenge of facing a club who are going for their seventh straight Serie A title, their third european final in four years and have conceded one goal in 16 matches, Mauricio Pochettino smiled. ‘Psychology,’ he said. ‘I won’t tell them.’
It is hard to keep Juventus a secret, however, just as Tottenham would find it hard to go under the radar, after a run of fine results in marquee matches this season.
Their seven points of nine in recent league meetings with Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal can be set beside the four points from six against Real Madrid in the Champions League group stage. That Tottenham are new arrivals in the Premier League’s top four — at the expense of Chelsea, short-term at least — is a mystery. Just as few teams will give Manchester United the chasing they received at Wembley last month, few can recall a north London derby as one-sided as the second half here.
Meaning there is good and bad news with Juventus looming tomorrow night. Good, in that if Tottenham play as they did against Arsenal, there is not a side in europe who would not be troubled by them. Bad, in that a game ending 1-0 could, had Spurs taken all of their chances after half-time, have been won by eight.
harry Kane scored and Christian eriksen had a dangerous free-kick from outside the area saved, but Kane, Kane, Dele Alli, erik Lamela, Kieran Trippier and Lamela again, may all feel they could have done more. Clubs of Juventus’s stature tend to make opponents regret mistakes in front of goal.
Pochettino watched the 2-0 win over Fiorentina on Friday, and knows Tottenham will have to be clinical in a way they were not on Saturday, even if his side’s display left him purring. ‘This was a very tough period, all big teams, so I think we showed great maturity, great character and the performance was so good,’ he said.
‘For me, it has been one of the best periods since I’ve been at Tottenham. We are winning because we are building something special. We are close, but not so close to win the title. But getting closer, no? When you beat Arsenal or Manchester United it means you have the quality to beat the big teams in europe, too. Of course, Juventus are a great team, one of the best in europe... but our belief, our confidence, our form are good and we are ready to be very competitive. I think the players know we don’t have to change too much and in the last three Premier League games they have started to feel good. It is important sometimes not to change too much.’
Arsenal have changed, it is said, but have they really? So many of the problems here were familiar. Laurent Koscielny apparently did not see the upside of jumping with the Premier League’s top goalscorer when Kane scored the winner. Mesut Ozil wasn’t greatly interested in stopping the player who supplied the cross, Ben Davies, getting out of his half.
henrikh Mkhitaryan was a crashing disappointment and when Alexandre Lacazette came
on he was played down the middle with Pierre- Emerick Aubameyang shifted to a wider role, so the Gabon striker had the perfect view of his replacement missing two sitters in injury time. Isn’t Aubameyang the better finisher? Why did Arsene Wenger arrange his forwards in this way?
Increasingly, Arsenal’s league campaign is fading into irrelevance. Six into four Champions League spots is becoming five into four as they lose ground.
‘I feel like in the first half we were just waiting for things to happen, we didn’t have the initiative to go forward, to keep the ball,’ said Hector Bellerin.
‘Towards the end we had a lot of chances and a lot of the ball but the game is about to finish.’
Maybe Arsenal believed their own publicity, about an unexpectedly positive transfer window creating a new momentum at the club. In November, they played Tottenham as if they were underdogs, snapping into tackles from the start. But here it was Spurs who played as if proving a point, braver, bolder, harder working.
Mousa Dembele was exceptional in midfield, Eriksen exceptionally creative. ‘The difference between now and when I came here, the first year, is massive,’ Dembele said. ‘Every year we improve. We feel like a top-four club, 100 per cent. We’re not scared to play any team, be it Arsenal or whoever.’
While Tottenham travel to Turin this week, Arsenal fly to Ostersund in Sweden, a fixture juxtaposition that highlights their increasingly reduced status.
Yet Wenger cannot even confidently target the Europa League as a route to Champions League qualification as Jose Mourinho did last year, with big fish including Serie A leaders Napoli still lurking. Ostersunds last conceded a goal on December 7 — but they have only played once since then, due to Scandinavia’s winter shutdown.
Revenge may be a dish best served cold, but even in sub-zero temperatures there is little chance of Arsenal reasserting their status. As they head into Europe, the varying trajectories of the north London clubs could not be made more obvious.